Hi
I’m fairly new to woodworking. My dad has some experience however. He has a Robland X26 wood combined machine, a band saw, compound miter saw and a few other tools and bits. More than enough to build the bed in the pictures.
So I basically want to copy the design of the Matera Bed (https://www.dwr.com/bedroom-beds/matera-bed/5114.html?lang=en_US). I’ve modelled it in sketchup, but I believe there are simpler ways of doing it, hence this post. The main goal is that the 4 legs must be the only points of the bed that should be grounded. The 3 drawers will float underneath the bed. The construction of the drawer frames, is what’s bothering me the most (please see attached pics)
Going to use blackwood for all visible parts and pine for the internal structure.
Any help, criticism, comments are welcome! Here to learn from the pros.
PS, if anyone actually have plans/blueprints of the bed, that’ll help me a ton!
Thank you in advance.
Replies
You don't mention what about the drawer frames worries you the most? Is it the construction of them, which given that they will be suspending the weight of the drawer from them, I might suggest running the stiles(vertical members) full height and the rails between them. My thoughts are that this will put the joint, mortise & tenon, floating tenon, dowels, etc., perpendicular to the force exerted by the weight of the drawers and much less likely to fail versus the design you currently have with joint inline with the force.
The easiest construction here would be to replace the frames with 3/4" plywood and not need to have any type of joint, but you miss out on a golden opportunity to practice mortise & tenon joinery, the gold std for solid wood construction.
I might also cut the slat support to fit between these frames rather than notch the frames around the support. I see no advantage to having a one piece slat support while it is much easier to cut the support to fit each opening vs notching the frames.
Your bed is actually very similar to a project I have underway with my daughter, a first time woodworker so if you have any other specific questions I may be able to shed some light on what we have encountered.
Just noticed a design discrepancy between your 2 images. The color image shows the bed rail protruding a couple of inches beyond the drawer faces, but from what I can tell your Sketchup model would have either flush inset drawer fronts or some style of overlay drawers. Are you aware of this? If not you will need to seperat the bed rail from the drawer support frames.
One more item. Beds need to broken down into reasonable sized pieces, your extensive use of cleats to hang your components implies a lot of screws and tedious assembly and disassembley. I would consider using some commercial bed hardware to facilitate the moving of the bed. The ones I have used with success are these:
https://www.rockler.com/heavy-duty-wrought-steel-bed-rail-fasteners-4-pack-select-size
Wow, honestly didn't expect this type of feedback!
Firsty, I agree with you that I will rather cut the slat support to fit in between the frame support, don't know why I designed it like that to be honest. That was probably my main concern, the fixing of the drawer frame to the bed rail. So now, without the notch, the fixing will be more sturdier!
In regards with the discrepancies, the picture without the matress is very crappy. but I would like for the drawers to not sit flush with the bed rails (I have attached a pic of the actual bed I'm copying) I've made the bed rail quite thick, to accommodate the inset look of the drawers and the thin piece of wood, fixed to the bottom of the drawer frames will act as a drawer stopper and also give more lateral support to the drawer frames.
Also, great advice on the cleats. It is probably something my dad would've change as well!
While I'm on a roll, I will also point out that the design also looks like a haven for dust bunnies. If it is only suspend a couple of inches over the floor it will be nearly impossible to clean under. I don't know if this is important or not, nor do I know why you prefer only 4 points of contact with the floor, but if it's only for aesthetics you can achieve the same thing with a 2" high frame painted black set back from the edge of the drawers a couple of inches. Such a frame would not only keep the dust bunnies manageable but also be able to support the weight of the drawers and make it easier to set them back from the bed rail itself.
I'm still not sure your design is going to give you the backseat for the drawer fronts you are looking for. If you use 8/4 stock planed to 1 3/4" which is usually best case scenario and quite heavy for a bedrail coupled with a full overlay drawer front made from 3/4" stock the backseat is only 1" that may not be sufficient to provide the look you want. The solution is to either inset the drawers and loose the smooth continuous face or to shorten the drawer support frames.
I might suggest using 5/4 stock for the bed rails backed by a full height(the dimension from the top of the slat support to the bottom of the bed rail) piece of 8/4 to support the slats and attach the frames to. This should provide a more dramatic 2" backset.
I built a bed two years ago and used inputs from my wife as well as from Japanese techniques to minimise the number of metal components, I ended with only two bolts, the rest is self locking.
One of the design criteria was make it easy to make the bed in the morning without squeezing your fingers between the mattress and the wood frame, thus the mattress sits on top of slats, very much like you have but there is no raised wood edge to hold it all around, and it does not move around, so this worked out well.
The center beam is a must, it keeps the mattress from bending down in the middle, yours is massive but even if your design wants only the 4 legs to touch the floor, I would consider adding an adjustable foot under the center beam, mine does not come close to the floor but its made of thick Hickory and is raised 1/2 inch higher than the bed frame so the slats are curved upwards, this works beautifully.
I dont have drawers but if I had some, I would use full extension slides simply screwed to 1 X 4 cross members spanning from the center beam to the edge of the bed frame, no drawer case, and would keep the drawer bottom off the floor enough so I can send in the vacuum cleaner hose.
Here are a few images of the build that can inspire you.
That was the rear bed frame attachment with 3/8 X 6 inches bolts. Here are the slats.
Hey,
My penny's worth - you can't get done til you get started. So your toughest decision is where to begin. I'd start from the ground up.
Curiosity query,, what kind of blackwood, African Blackwood or ebony? Ideas and design changes will come to you. I say design changes because you'll want to make the bed yours, the build to the finish.
Mikaol
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